How brand marketing is affected by foreign ownership

Britain’s economic clout and global business centres provide the opportunity for UK companies to operate all over the world. And naturally, this can make them attractive purchasing propositions to foreign buyers based outside of the UK. The current spate of brands now not owned in the UK, Cadbury being the most high profile, has raised questions about how marketing tactics will shift and whether it will negatively impact their presence in the UK. This viewpoint simply isn’t true, and if anything it is the complete opposite.

It’s unlikely that marketing strategies will shift if a creative agency already doing fantastic work for these brands is in place – after all, they understand the product, its proposition and positioning better than any agency based elsewhere, and decision makers know this. The adage of “if it’s not broken, don’t fix it” comes to mind. And in any case, the extra funds brought in by the purchase will likely see marketing budgets rise considerably, allowing for wider scale campaigns that involve digital and social media agencies, if they don’t already.

The fear of British brands being taken over by developing businesses in the East is really becoming quite old-fashioned as the world economy becomes ever more globalised. With gyro being a global B2B agency, we see the benefits of such a globalised world every day. Takeovers are likely to help brands and businesses gain the funds they need, and this can only be a good thing for marketers.